This article is part of our East Coast Offense series.
The Team I Wish I Drafted
It's easy in hindsight to draft a winning team, but with the benefit of 20/20, I'd want to do better than that; I want one that would not only win, but would do so despite getting mercilessly mocked and draw the most sidebets. So if I could go back to August, here's how I would have drafted:
Round 1: Rob Gronkowski - not worried about his knee.
Round 2: Jeremy Maclin - not worried about his knee.
Round 3: Andrew Luck - expecting a breakout.
Round 4: T.Y. Hilton - wanted to pair with Luck.
Round 5: Emmanuel Sanders - Welker is toast, and I have a feeling it's the year of the little receiver.
Round 6: Steve Smith - need a flex, and Smith possesses rare age-defying rage.
Round 7: Ben Roethlisberger - might need a backup QB for two games mid-season. In fact, might start him when the Steelers play the Colts.
Round 8: Dwayne Allen - going all-in on the Colts pass offense.
Round 9: Knile Davis - could need some early-season RB production - have a feeling Jamaal Charles will get hurt for a few games.
Round 10: Eagles defense - it's never too early to draft a Chip Kelly defense.
Round 11: Stephen Gostkowski - love locking down a great kicker.
Round 12: Ahmad Bradshaw - as I said, all-in on the Colts passing game.
Round 13: Odell Beckham - need someone who can single-handedly make big plays.
Round 14: Justin Tucker - just in case the Pats struggle to score early in the year, I like to have a second kicker.
Round 15: Justin Forsett - there's got to be more video of what happened with Ray Rice - it's a casino elevator, and it'll come out sooner or later. Pretty sure Goodell will cave to public pressure and up the suspension.
Round 16: C.J. Anderson - you never know with RB - could be useful for the fantasy playoffs.
Round 17: Isaiah Crowell - like his quickness, and Ben Tate is washed up.
Round 18: Packers defense - should rack up points at home.
Round 19: Latavius Murray - like his upside late in the year.
Round 20: Jonas Gray - might be useful in Week 11. (Though I might drop him for LeGarrette Blount the Tuesday after - two days ahead of his oversleeping - and the team's signing of Blount).
I'm not sure this team would win in the playoffs, but it surely would be 11-1 or 10-2 at worst and would be miles ahead in total points. And I'm positive I'd coax large sidebets out of everyone in the league.
Bad Taste on Twitter
Yesterday, I saw a tweet that Eric Berry was sidelined with a non-NFL related illness, and I joked he probably got sick from watching tape of Latavius Murray pulling away from him on that 90-yard run. Within seconds, 10 people called me out, ranging from "Bro, he's got cancer" (reasonable) to "**** off you tasteless piece of *** ...might want to fact-check first before you say something really stupid..."
Of course, once I realized the seriousness of Berry's illness, I apologized - for anyone to get hit with that likely diagnosis is tragic, and particularly so for a guy in his mid-20s at the peak of his athletic career. But even if my first tweet was ill-timed, why is it necessary to assume the absolute worst intentions behind it? Is it any wonder why so many media stars' Twitter accounts are so bland, or so many feel compelled to state the obligatory platitudes whenever a famous person they don't even know dies, or some tragic event happens in a place they've never been?
Don't be a Twitter policeman. If someone says something with which you disagree, by all means argue your case if you like. Or ignore, mock or unfollow. But the reflexive, indignant pile-on for every gaffe (without even asking what's meant) only ensures one result: self-censorship. While it won't work on me (for the most part*), it does have an effect on the overall discourse, and it's a pernicious one.
* I do admit occasionally to emailing would-be tweets to friends that I really want to post but don't because they would get me in big trouble. Only professional comedians can get away with saying that kind of stuff in public, and that's unfortunate.
Three Kinds of NFL Commercials
There are typically three kinds of commercials while you're watching football:
(1) Outright lies; (2) Based on lies; and (3) Misleading. In Category 3, are your basic cellphone and car commercials that display the product to which they purport, but associate with it all sorts of glamorous activities to which they have no relation whatsoever. Yeah, sure LeBron James is pulling up in a Kia. (I'm pretty sure there's a clause in James' will specifying even his corpse never be transported in a Kia.)
Category 2 includes the fast food commercials that have good-looking people or hipsters eating at those places, having a great time. It's possible you'd find on rare occasion (2 am, drunk) some of them there, but if an ad agency went the documentary route, we'd be seeing mostly poverty, misery and ill-health. You can also include most of the Big Pharma ads. I assume these products work at least temporarily for their narrowly stated purposes, but the list of side effects usually includes "death" and worse, and their unstated premise is: "Don't bother changing your unhealthy habits. Get hooked on these pills for the rest of your life instead."
In Category 1, there are the flat-out lies, like the notion low-quality, mass-produced light beer is a staple at great parties/bar scenes, or Papa Johns (Fritos?) has " all natural ingredients." I suppose everything's "natural" in some sense – after all uranium is an element, so nuclear waste is ultimately from nature too. But I don't think that's what they were going for. Peyton Manning is the worst offender in this category - I'd believe LeBron James lives in a Kia before buying that Manning hangs out in the kitchen bantering with that Papa John's tool, or sings aloud each thing he does to the tune of the Nationwide jingle. No one's that much of a psychopath.
This is what recurs to me while waiting for review after review (Dez Bryant's TD catch, then the 4th-down non-conversion that ended the game) when my team's losing, and precious minutes of my time on the planet are flushed away like run-off from the feedlot operations that supply so many of the NFL's sponsors with low-quality meat. One could argue I shouldn't take it personally – maybe I'm just not the target audience – but I disagree. They're quite obviously mocking me, just like the game is mocking me when Eli Manning misses a wide-open Preston Parker on a sure TD that would have put the Giants up 11, or when Manning flat-out didn't see a wide-open Odell Beckham for a would-be 70-plus yard TD. It's deliberate and calculated and deeply cynical.
Week 12 Observations
• It was very hard to take anything out of the Jets-Bills game except that I'm glad there was another one on halfway through it.
• The Saints looked more like themselves, moving the ball consistently against the Ravens, but their defense is so poor, they can't even win at home anymore against decent teams like the Ravens and Bengals.
• Kenny Stills and Marques Colston saw more targets Monday night, partly a function of Brandin Cooks' injury, but also because both Ravens safety Will Hill played surprisingly well in coverage against Jimmy Graham and Mark Ingram got stuffed by the Ravens defense. While Stills and Colston should both have bigger roles with Cooks out for the year, Ingram and Graham should have considerably better games against the Steelers this week.
• The Giants looked great for much of the first half, between Beckham's other-worldly catch and Manning's crisp passing. The offensive line is strangely inconsistent though, looking adequate on some series, then out to lunch on others. Beckham looks like peak Victor Cruz combined with peak Hakeem Nicks, only faster. He's got Cruz's quickness and start-stop ability, Nicks' big hands and ability to play bigger than his frame to operate in the red zone and on contested passes.
• Rashad Jennings is a good running back, but the Giants offensive inconsistency makes it hard for him to get into a rhythm. They also used Andre Williams, who made a couple decent blocks in pass protection, more than usual with Jennings healthy.
• The Giants defense simply can't get a pass rush, and frankly they needed to blitz because you can't cover Dez Bryant (especially with three-fifths of the secondary on IR) for seven seconds. Tony Romo and DeMarco Murray played fine, but it was the mismatch on the line and the lack of creative adjustment that ultimately did the Giants in.
• The Dolphins-Broncos was a shootout of the kind that's been rare this year, with both teams over 30 points, and both quarterbacks putting up big numbers. I don't know whether to call it a backdoor cover by Miami because they were the right side the whole way until Denver backdoored them first after a late Ryan Tannehill pick.
• The 49ers and Redskins are both unwatchable in their own right, and the effect of them playing each other was exponentially worse. The nicest thing I can say about Robert Griffin is he needs a factory reset. Wipe the hard drive clean and start over. He took another five sacks this game which doesn't sound that crazy until you realize he attempted only 19 passes. Even the NSA can't install that kind of malware.
• The Chargers were in great shape to cover the five-point spread, up 10 with the Rams set to punt on 4th-and-4 from their own 26 with 7:26 left. Of course, the Rams should go for it in that situation, but because most coaches are too cowardly ever to consider that possibility, the Chargers also didn't consider Jeff Fisher might fake the punt. This was a mistake because Fisher not only faked a punt in his own territory (with a 4th-quarter lead) against Seattle this year, he's faked more punts than any coach in the NFL over his career. In any event, the fake worked, and the Chargers went from unlucky not to cover, to lucky to win at all. Paradoxically, had the Rams gotten a game-tying field goal at the end, San Diego once again might have covered in overtime.
• The Cardinals sacked Russell Wilson seven times, but Wilson led the team with 73 rushing yards and managed 9.6 YPA in a field-goal fest. No one on Arizona did anything.
• The Texans-Bengals were on CBS (Channel 2), while all my other early games were in the 700s. Given this inconvenience, I had no reason to watch it except for the rare occasions when every other game on my two screens went to commercial. I did appreciate Andy Dalton's well-timed pick-six to put the game back in range, but ultimately it wasn't enough.
• The Titans sort of showed up against the Eagles, and Zach Mettenberger (whom I benched in a last-second call for Blake Bortles in a two-QB league) put up big numbers. Mark Sanchez alternately looked sharp and shaky like he has since he took over. While Nick Foles took a big step back this year, I'm not sure Sanchez is making much of a case for himself, either.
• LeSean McCoy finally had a big game, but it came with only one catch and Darren Sproles took one of his TDs. Jordan Matthews outperformed Jeremy Maclin again too, undermining the one sure-thing the Eagles had before Foles went down.
• The Patriots are usually the square side because they're such a public team, but there was no way I could take Matt Stafford and Jim Caldwell in that stadium without getting double-digit points. Tom Brady made for a good start because you knew the Pats would avoid running into the teeth of that line. Consequently, Brady had 53 attempts, and the team had 20 combined rushes.
• Julian Edelman caught 11 more passes but for only 89 yards. He did have an incredible kick return for a TD that was called back on a hold. I don't think the NFL should bother with returns anymore – just assume the hold and spot the ball 10 yards behind where the returner would have caught it.
• Matt Stafford completed 18 of 46 attempts (39%, 5.7 YPA). I get the Lions lack receiver depth, but if Calvin Johnson, Golden Tate and three people picked from the crowd at random aren't enough, it'll never be enough.
• Eddie Lacy's quietly earning his early-round draft slot the last six or seven games. Otherwise it was a fairly unremarkable game except for illustrating high-powered teams will usually have to grind out some ugly wins along the way, especially on the road.
• Aside from a lost fumble, Dan Herron – like everyone before him – outproduced Trent Richardson. Richardson did score a TD, but Herron also caught five passes to his none. Bortles is arguably the worst starting QB in the NFL right now – (it's between him, Griffin and whoever the Jets and Texans are using.)
• Bizarrely, Josh McCown passed for 341 yards (7.1 YPA) while Jay Cutler passed for 130 (4.8 YPA), but the Bears won 21-13. The Bucs defense has played much better the last two weeks, but it's hard to say whether that's them or the offenses (Washington, Chicago) they faced falling apart.
• The Browns won despite Brian Hoyer nearly gifting the game away with some terrible interceptions, something Hoyer admitted after the game. Josh Gordon was as good as ever and could have had a much bigger day than his 8-for-120 had Hoyer been sharper.
• Incidentally, Gordon's most amazing play wasn't on a catch – it was on a botched reverse he recovered 20 yards deep in his own backfield that he had the presence of mind to throw out of bounds for an incomplete pass. Whatever he's ingested, his brain seems to be a lot clearer than those of the coaches making fourth down and timeout decisions every Sunday.
